No.2 Pencil Optional: Drew Snubs the SAT

By MAREK FUCHS

Published: September 25, 2005

DREW UNIVERSITY will no longer require prospective students to provide the results of their standardized tests, and school officials hope the move will attract a larger number of applicants and a greater percentage of minority students.

''We consistently hear how with our low student-faculty ratio, students feel treated as individuals,'' Robert Weisbuch, Drew's new president, said in a telephone interview. But an admissions policy based in part on flat scores, he said, did not always reflect that sense. ''We want adventurous learners,'' he said, ''but it happens that adventurous learners don't always take tests well.''

Drew, based in Madison, has become the most prominent school in the state to no longer require the tests. In making the decision, announced last Monday, Drew officials cited what they called an inability of such measures to distinguish between applicants, predict how students will perform in college or treat minority students fairly. The move, weighed at various times in the school's past, gathered steam this summer when two outside consultants were hired and simultaneously recommended it.

The move also marks the university's first major shift in policy under the leadership of Mr. Weisbuch, the former president of the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship in Princeton. He replaced Thomas H. Kean, the former governor of New Jersey and chairman of the Sept. 11 Commission, as Drew's president last spring. Mr. Kean had held the post for 15 years.

The policy, which will be put in place right away, makes the submission of scores optional. Instead of sending SAT I and ACT scores, an applicant is required to send a high school paper, such as an English paper, graded by a teacher. Results will be monitored to determine whether what Mr. Weisbuch is currently calling an experiment should be made permanent or scrapped.

About a quarter of all colleges nationwide no longer require standardized tests, according to the National Center for Fair and Open Testing, which is based in Cambridge, Mass., and opposes testing. Many of these schools are small and obscure, but Drew, with 1,600 students and a profile that grew markedly during Mr. Kean's tenure, hopes its results will reflect those of some liberal arts schools with top reputations, like Bates and Hamilton, which took similar routes.

Bates, in Lewiston, Me., was one of the first schools to go to a SAT-optional format. A study, much discussed after it was presented at a National Association for College Admission Counseling national conference, showed little difference in success rates between those who submit the scores and non-submitters in the 20 years since the policy was put into place in 1984.

It is impossible to separate eliminating the standardized tests from other variables. But now in its fifth year under the policy, Hamilton College in Clinton, N.Y., has had an increase in the enrollment of minority students -- the figure rising to 18 percent from 12 percent -- and a jump in those coming to the school from the top 10 percent of their high school class, said Monica Inzer, the college's dean of admissions.

Muhlenburg, in Allentown, Pa., went SAT optional a decade ago. Chris Hooker-Haring, dean of admissions, said that between 8 percent and 14 percent of those admitted choose to hold back their scores. In a study of the differences between the two pools of students over the last five years, he added that submitters averaged 1219 on their SAT's and non-submitters 1003. But there was little difference in grade-point averages in their time at Muhlenberg.

The decision is not without potential downsides. Next fall's college class will be the first one to have taken the essay portion of the SAT. Many in admissions circles have been talking about how the essay, written under supervision, will be a good way to check the legitimacy of application essays, sometimes the product of high-priced coaching or parental assistance. Mr. Weisbuch said that was one of the factors the school would monitor.

And some call the SAT-optional route a ruse to eliminate lower SAT scores from the consideration of the high-profile college ranking lists. But Muhlenberg, for example, asks non-submitters to submit after being accepted. Drew has not decided whether it will follow that path.

Even so, the entire admissions process, somewhere between a science, art and crapshoot, is helped by a ''reliable and highly professional standard to act as an equalizer,'' said Caren Scoropanos, a spokeswoman for the College Board, which administers the SAT. ''Unless you have a very keen sense of this high school or that high school, you can't always tell how good a student is by grades alone.''

And not all at Drew are totally pleased with the new approach, even the man in charge who helped spearhead the move. ''As someone who always took tests well,'' Mr. Weisbuch said, ''it does hurt my feelings.''

Photo: Robert Weisbuch, Drew's president, said he hopes to attract ''adventurous learners, but it happens that adventurous learners don't always take tests well.'' (Photo by Nancy Wegard for The New York Times)